Pip

Pip is a critter added in the Launch Update. Pips eat growing branches straight off the Arbor Tree, similar to Dreckos. Pips excrete Dirt.

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Behavior
The Pip can plant seeds in natural tiles with a hardness rating under 150. They will plant waterweed seeds in only if the materials have salt water above. They do not appear to plant other seeds in materials with salt water. They will not plant a seed in a target tile if there are already 3 or more plants within an area: 5 up, 5 to the right, 6 down and 6 to the left  from the tile. Pips will only carry seeds for about 30 tiles - if there is no tile eligible for planting within this distance, they will leave seeds where they are. They are capable of planting in farm tiles, which will also domesticate a plant.

They are able to cling strongly to any surface, and will freely wander the full perimeter of whatever chamber they are in. They are not hostile and are quite mobile, inevitably wandering away from any chamber they are not trapped in. They also can seed hanging plants from the underside.

Occasionally, Pips will navigate to storage containers and knock several kilograms of items out of them. You can prevent this from happening by putting Pneumatic Doors or Auto-Sweepers in front of your storage.

Another annoyance can be provided if they wander into empty farm plots, since they will plant seeds there too.

Building farms
It is possible to use their ability to plant plants in natural tiles to build farms that require no resources. It is possible to make a farm of plants planted on every other block horizontally and every 5 blocks vertically by forcing the pips to plant from the top right going left and doing the rows from the top down.

Pips will not plant a seed where the building is planned for construction. You can use it by placing e.g. ladders everywhere, with priority 1, and then cancelling construction - almost immediately Pip will carry a seed to that location (assuming all other conditions are met).

There is a bug where two plants can be planted in the same spot, which will prevent Pips from planting where it looks like they should.

Creating natural tiles

 * Shove Voles eat iron, regolith, dirt, and will then excrete natural tiles accordingly. Tiles placement and vole management may be tedious.
 * Heating up 5 kg piles of Fertilizer, Algae or Slime on the floor above 125 °C will turn them into dirt tiles.
 * Manual Airlock can be surrounded by 9 tiles, with free tile above. Destroynig manual airlock will turn it into tile of respective ore.
 * Liquid phosphorus and sulfur can be delivered via Pitcher Pump/Bottle Emptiers, and cooled down. They will turn into natural tiles if their mass is enough (strictly above 160kg and 400kg respectively).
 * For planting Sleet Wheat and other cold-tolerant plants, water can be poured into place and then Frozen into natural Ice tiles. Mostly useful on Rime

Dense Arbor Tree Farm
Pips' nimble paws allow them to plant seeds in Farm Tiles between Arbor Trees that duplicants can't. A space-efficient Arbor Tree farm can be built by dispensing Arbor Tree seeds and a pip in an enclosed room with farm tile floor. Eventually, all tiles will be planted by the pip. The same trick applies to a Farm Tile adjacent to other buildings as well, as long as the 3 tiles space above it is not obstructed.

Pip Ranching
Pips require 0.325 wild or 0.08 domestic Arbor Tree per Pip to stay fed. A maximum size ranch can be supported by 3 wild or 1 domestic Arbor Tree.

Pips can process wild Arbor Trees into free dirt, and extract otherwise inaccessible Arbor Acorns, which allows to plant more Arbor Trees.

Pips can reach all branches from the base of the arbor tree.

Bugs

 * Pips can plant in entombed Flower Pots, which results on tame plants that don't need solid fertilizer to grow.
 * Pips can plant several seeds on the same tile when manipulated to do so.

Trivia

 * Wild, happy Pips lay their eggs when they are 65 cycles old.
 * Just before a Pip is killed by a dupe, there is a chance the mood message "Forgiveness" appears.
 * Pips are called Squirrels in game files.

Links

 * Pip Planting: Everything You Need to Know on Klei forums.

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